Time to keep your music festival promises, Dominic Perrottet

The two biggest Australian music festivals have called on the NSW government to honour its promise to protect them against financial loss.

Splendour in the Grass co-founder Jessica Ducrou. Picture: Chris Pavlich

The two biggest Australian music festivals, Splendour in the Grass and Bluesfest, have called on the NSW government to honour its promise to protect them against financial loss in the event of Covid health orders shutting down their events.

Organisers fear the government will back down on its vow, as there has not been any apparent progress on the plan since the promise was made in discussions in April.

Byron Bay event Bluesfest suffered significant losses when it was cancelled by NSW public health order on March 31, after one Covid case was detected in the Byron Shire.

In the aftermath, Bluesfest ­director Peter Noble received ­assurances that a major events ­interruption fund was in train with NSW Treasury.

“On Easter Saturday, April 3, I received a phone call from the NSW Treasurer, Dominic Perrottet,” Noble told The Australian. “Within that phone call, I was ­advised that the NSW government would be creating a fund.

“That fund was there to assist major events going forward to invest and be incentivised, knowing that their losses will be covered up to whatever degree was finally ­decided in the legislation.”

Mr Perrottet also mentioned an insurance scheme for major events in television news reports that aired on April 3, and Noble said his decision to reschedule Bluesfest from Easter to October was based on these assurances.

Five months later, there has been no apparent action on this front.

“Promises were made by the government; promises are made to be kept,” said Noble. “Please show our industry the respect of making those public statements and those undertakings, and ­actually delivering and not stonewalling us.

“Just do what you said you were going to do, so that our industry feels that we’re considered and that you care about us.

“I’d like to feel that our government can be trusted to deliver on what they say they’re going to deliver – in a timely manner, so that we can plan forward. God knows our industry needs it.”

Fellow Byron event Splendour in the Grass recently announced that its festival planned for Nov­ember would be rescheduled to July 2022, given the current Covid outbreaks across NSW.

“We’re asking for insurance that would cover our costs should our event be cancelled by a Covid outbreak,” Splendour co-founder Jessica Ducrou said.

“We’re not asking for money upfront; it’s as a safeguard to any border closures or event shutdowns that may affect us operating or executing the show.”

Bluesfest, too, recently rescheduled its planned October event to April 2022.

The Australian sent queries to NSW Treasury on this matter.

These were forwarded to the office of Stuart Ayres, the Jobs, Investment and Tourism Min­ister, which provided a short statement.

“Destination NSW has consulted with industry on event ­interruption support,” said a spokesman.

“Options are now being dev­eloped for government to ­consider.”

Historically, major multi-day camping festivals like Splendour and Bluesfest have had no reason to call for financial support.

“We are commercial, and we’ve never had to rely on government support to date; we’ve been self-sustainable,” said ­Ducrou, whose 2019 Splendour festival attracted a record 42,500 people.

“We can’t, in all honesty, launch an event without knowing that we have some sort of coverage, should there be a lockdown that would affect the festival.

“That needs to happen now, because of the long leads required to plan our festival.

“We need that resolution ­before events can operate again.”